The Social Geography of Montreal in 1971
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THE SOCIAL GEOGRAPHY OF MONTREAL IN 1971 Peter Foggin and Mario Polese Research Paper No. 88 A translation of "La Geographie Sociale de Montreal en 1971", published originally by Institut national de la recherche scientifique I.N.R.S.-Urbanisation 3465, rue Durocher, Montreal H2X 2C6, Quebec Centre for Urban and Community Studies University of Toronto May 1977 PREFACE This paper was originally published in French in the series Etudes et Documents of the Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique (I.N.R.S.) - Urbanisation, Universit€ du Quebec, Montreal. It has been republished in this Centre's series, in English, to encourage a wider exchange and dissemination of the results of research on individual Canadian cities and to stimulate more comparative studies of the changing character of those cities. We are particularly grateful to the authors, Peter Foggin and Mario Palese, for undertaking the task of translating their paper and for their positive response to our request for an exchange. We also wish to thank the I.N.R.S.-Urbanisation, and their Director, Professor Jean-Claude Thibodeau, for permission to reprint the paper here. L. S. Bourne May 1977 ABSTRACT On the basis of 63 variables drawn from the 1971 census, the authors describe the social and residential geography of the Montreal metropolitan area. With the aid of factor analysis they describe the patterns shaping Montreal's residential space, thereby attempting to better understand how Montrealers choose their residential locations. The results show that the principal factors underlying such choices are social, family and ethnic status. Finally, with these factors and with a cluster analysis of 368 census tracts, the authors identify homogeneous social areas within Montreal. 3. INTRODUCTION What are the main factors shaping Montreal residential space ? How are Montrealers distributed over urban space ? Do homogeneous social areas exist within metropolitan Montreal ? By answering these questions, we hope to draw a portrait of Montreal's social and residential geography in 1971. Canada's 1971 census provides a vast amount of information for each urban census tract1. All these data are clearly not equally impor tant for our purposes : some are more significant than others for understanding and describing a city's social space. On the basis of an earlier Canada-wide study2 we retained 63 variables (table 1). In this paper we hope to si.munarize and synthesize the information they contain with the purpose of describing the main traits of Montreal's residential geography. Factor analysis is a classic method for summarizing the many 3 interrelationships contained in a data matrix . When applied to data referring to intra-urban spatial units (such as census tracts) rather than to individuals, one generally uses the term 11 factorial ecology". In this chapter we present a factorial ecology of the Montreal metropolitan area. 1. The ori~inal tape supplied by Statistics Canada contained 1,106 items of information for each of the 579 census tracts of metropolitan Montreal, as defined by Statistics Canada. 2. That study, directed by Serge Carlos and Mario Polese, was conducted for the Ministry of State for Urban Affairs. Its principal resultswere presented to a colloquium on mathematical methods in geography held at the University of Besan~on in October 1975. That paper, revised and enlarged, will be published in a future number of the Etudes et Documents of I.N.R.S.-Urbanisation, Universite du Quebec. 3. We assume that the reader is acquainted with factor analysis. If not, the following works may be consulted : L. King, Statistical Analysis in Geography, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., Prentice Hall, 1969, and R. Runnnel, Applied Factor Analysis, Evanston, North-Western University Press, 1970. 4. Table 1 Variables chosen for the analysis of the Montreal region 1. Family income ($) 1-1999 32. ~.~other tongue English 2. 2000-3999 33. French 3. 6000-9999 34. Age : 0-4 4. 10000-14999 35. 5-9 s. 15000 + 36. 10-14 6. Personnal income ($): 2000-3999 37. 20-24 7. 4000-5999 38. 25-34 8. 6000-9999 39. 45-54 9. 15000 + 40. 55-64 10. Occupation Management 41. 65-69 11. Professional and tech. 42. Married 12. Office worker 43. Separated 13. Sales 44. Widower or widow 14. Services 45. Single home 15. Manufacturing 46. Apartment 16. Construction/Transport47. Owner 17. Education Elementary 48. Bath/shower only user 18. Secondary 49. 1 toilet only user 19. University degree SO. 2 toilets only user 20. Place of Birth : Quebec 51. Nuptiality index : 15-24 unmarried 21. United Kingdom 15-24 married 22. Italy 52. Children less than 6 years old 23. Ethnic origin British 53. Children from 0 to 14 years old 24. French 54. Children from 6 to 14 years old 25. German SS. Children from 15 to 24 years old 26. Italian 56. No children 27. Dutch 57. Non-family household - 1 person 28. Scandinavian 58. Non-family household - 2 or more 29. Date of immigration : Bef0re 1931 persons 30. 1946-1971 59. Family household - 2 persons 31. Not applica- 60. 4 persons ble 61. 6 persons 62. Number of rooms/dwelling 63. Numbers of persons/room N.B. 113 original variables were reduced to 63 in the following manner : a factor analysis using the 113 original variables was performed on all the census tracts of Canada's 21 metropolitan areas. After studying the 6 main factors tL~t emerged, it was decided to retain only those variables with a loading of 0.60 or higher. The reduced set of 63 variables constitutes the data base for our studies, city by city. 5. 1. PREVIOUS STUDIES 1.1 Factorial ecology and the theory of residential location We are by no means the first to employ a factorial ecology. An 1 abundant literature precedes us . Few indeed are the cities whose social geography has not been studied by means of a factorial ecology2 This method has become one of the basic tools of urban analysis, especially for determining social areas. Its success is undoubtedly explained by the fact that it has often produced results that accord both with the classical frameworks of human ecology and with more recent theories of residential location. Let us recall that the aim of factorial ecology is to summarize or synthesize, in several dimensions (factors), the many variables that can characterize urban social spaces. In the vast majority of studies, one almost always finds three types of dimensions : a socio-economic dimension; a dimension having to do with family structure or with the life cycle; and, in cities of a diversified ethnic nature (racially, religiously, linguistically and so on), one also finds ethnic dimensions. In sum, the spatial variation displayed by different variables can generally be explained by these few common dimensions. 1. See, notably, B. Berry (editor) , "Comparative factorial ecology", in Economic Geography, vol. 47, no 2 (supplement), 1971, and R. Murdie, Factorial Ecology of Metropolitan Toronto, University of Chicago, Geography Department, Research Paper no 116, 1969. 2. "Factorial ecology" or "factor analysis" are generic names. There exists a whole series of statistical techniques that are commonly gathered under the "factor analysis" label (for example : principal components analysis, image analysis, not to mention the whole range of possible factor rotations). 6. The meaning of these three types of dimensions is not hard to interpret. The existence of a socio-economic dimension simply tells us that the different variables that measure social status (education, income, occupation, etc.) tend to vary together over residential space. In other words, individuals 0r households tend to group in urban space according to their common social characteristics. Similarly, the existence of a life-cycle dimension reflects the fact that the different demographic indicators (such as age, family status and number of children) vary together in urban space and that consequently neighborhoods (social areas) arise partly as a result of the demographic characteristics of households 1 and individuals. As B. Greer-Wootten notes "If a city's population ' has a relatively homogeneous culture, these two dimensions explain the 1 arges t part of the variance of a set of characteristics associated with each observation (census tracts) and define the city's social space". In sum, according to the model that has just been described, indivi duals and households are distributed over social and residential space according to their socio-economic and family characteristics. If, in addition, there are important ethnic groups in the city, they will also locate in keeping with their affinities in this regard. The social areas of a city can thus be defined in terms of these three criteria. Such a model is indeed very simple, but it never theless follows the tradition of classical models of human ecology which postulate a typical spatial distribution for each dimension. 2 Thus, H. Hoyt postulates that the socio-economic dimension develops sectorially, from the center of the city toward its periphery, along I. B. Greer-Wootten, ''Le modele urbain", in Ludger Beauregard (ed.), Montreal. Guide d'excursions, Montreal, Les Presses de l'Uni versite de Montreal, 1972. 2. H. Hoyt, The Structure and Growth of Residential Neighborhoods in American Cities, Washington, D.C., U.S. Government Printing Office, 1939. 7. 1 major transportation axes. E. Burgess on the other hand, postulates that the life-cycle dimension develops in the form of concentric 2 zones . The implicit causal element in all these fra~works is the residential choice made by households. Spatial arrangements reflect the decisions made by households given their need for space and intimacy, and their need to commute (between home and work). These choices also depend on their relative incomes and wealth and on conditions in the housing market.